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Why Dr. Benjamin Carson Scares the Left

RUSH: Some people were asking me about Ben Carson last night. And I said, "Let me tell you what his secret is. People are not able to detect an agenda when Ben Carson speaks. That's the magic." And it's the same thing with Obama. Obama does not appear to have an agenda. At least people don't attach an agenda to him. What that means is, people are not, therefore, automatically predisposed to being wary. People who have agendas, and those agendas are known, will automatically have people suspicious of them. Because what is an agenda? It means many things to many people.

When you get to the low-information crowd, an agenda is a design, a plan you have for them and about them over which they may not have any control. They're very suspicious of agendas. That's why anybody that has one is automatically a suspect. It's just human nature. It's the way things exist in the country and in our culture today. It hasn't always been this way, but it is now.

Well, Dr. Carson is able to make a speech, to appear at the National Prayer Breakfast, to be a guest on a TV show, to tell you what he thinks, and even tells you the way he thinks things should be. But nobody thinks that he's got an agenda. So there's no grand design. There's no perception that he wants to force people to do something. And that's what many people think of as an agenda. And that, I think, is one of Obama's secret techniques. He gets away with not having an agenda. And to the extent that he does have an agenda, it's fighting these mysterious, powerful forces that are destroying everything. And what's ironic about this is that there hasn't been a president in a hundred years who's had this kind of naked desire to subjugate people and to control them. And yet the low-information crowd that supports Obama, that's the last thing they think about him.

You stop and think about this and it'll make sense to you. It's why Benjamin Carson is universally popular right now. It's because he doesn't appear to have an agenda. And in order for him to maintain that position, he's making it clear to anybody that he's not a Republican, not a conservative. If anything, he's an independent. He wants it known that he's critical of people from both parties, or all five parties, however many parties there are, he's critical of all of them. As opposed to me. I am, obviously, associated with an agenda, and I don't hide behind it. I'm not afraid of having an agenda.

I do have an agenda. It's a positive agenda. It's multifaceted. It includes the success of this radio program, and also I have an agenda for things I'd like to see happen in the country. And that, with certain people, just scares them. It makes 'em suspicious. Even though everybody has agendas, the people who can comport themselves in ways that hide the fact they have an agenda, makes them less threatening. I think if you look at Dr. Carson, would anybody accuse him of being threatening? Nobody.

Now, the Democrats are scared to death of this guy for the very reasons I have just explained. They are scared to death, precisely because he has the ability to reach people, deeply, without appearing to have an agenda. So there's no threat. But I threaten the feminists. I threaten the left that disagrees with me, so they're naturally predisposed to wait and oppose me.

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RUSH: Just to illustrate my point that I was making. Dr. Ben Carson is so good right now, the New York Times has an article, has a story on him today that is in no way a hit piece. It's not blatant, not subtle, there's no hit piece aspect at all. The headline of the Times story on Ben Carson is: "Neurosurgeon’s Speeches Have Conservatives Dreaming of 2016." The headline is not: "Neurosurgeon Has Designs on White House for 2016 and is Attempting to Persuade Conservatives." It's not that at all.

The headline is about him. His speeches have conservatives dreaming. The headline's about what conservatives are doing, not what he's doing. It is remarkably hate free, for a guy who took it right to Obama on Obamacare at the National Prayer Breakfast. It's amazing.

Now, the thing that needs to be said here is the New York Times doesn't yet see him as a real threat. They don't believe that he is really gonna run for office. They think it's just a conservative dream. So they're at the stage now where, okay, let's build the guy up a little bit because if the day comes that we have to chop him down, such as the chop and grind, whatever they do in Houston, then it will be a bigger fall. And that's what they're doing, make no mistake. They're building him up big time now. So if they have to chop him down, the fall will be huge. But right now, no hate, no criticism at all.

If you stop and think about it, in many ways -- and I mean this -- in many ways, Dr. Benjamin Carson is everything Obama pretended to be from 2004 to 2008: postracial, postpartisan, a healer, he's really a healer. He's a neurosurgeon. He saves the brains of the children. He's a real healer. He has demonstrable experience and success in the private sector. But right now, Ben Carson is probably, in a lot of ways, everything Obama pretended to be, and everything that people thought Obama was. He's the polar opposite of Obama, in most ways. Here's a little excerpt from the New York Times piece on Ben Carson.

"He is in some ways a dream candidate for Republicans. But he also fits nicely into the realm of fantasy where the very early jockeying over 2016 now plays out. No modern contender without a political résumé has ever gotten close to a major party nomination."Meaning, no modern contender without a political agenda. The word is key; they use "resume" but they mean "agenda." Designs, objective, blueprint, whatever. They don't see any of that with him yet. He's just a guy who saves the brains of the children, who's talking about politics. And a bunch of lightweight conservatives are having fantasies. That's where they are right now.

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RUSH: This is Paula. Roanoke, Virginia. Hi, Paula. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.

CALLER: Thanks. Thanks for having my call. I appreciate it. Listen, I wanted to touch on your comments on getting the conservative message out to low-information voters?

RUSH: Yes, ma'am.

CALLER: I'll tell you a little bit about what I've been doing and what I think I might be accomplishing. After 2012 I started a one-woman e-mail campaign to John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, the RNC, any conservative Republicans I could find on the Internet, begging them to get conservatives out to minority neighborhoods, sit down with small groups of people, say in their church meeting rooms where they'll be comfortable, and explain conservatism versus liberalism. Not Republicanism, not Democrats, but conservatism in the vein of Dr. Carson. He just tickled me to death when he got up and spoke at that prayer breakfast.

RUSH: Right.

CALLER: Now, just the other day I couldn't believe this. Reince Priebus came out and said that they are going to start sending out their employees to neighborhoods. I hope that's what he's talking about.

RUSH: Well, I don't want to disappoint you. No, no. I don't. I hope that what you are envisioning at some point does happen. You know what the real key to that is, is not just explaining conservatism. The real thing is telling these people about liberalism.

CALLER: Exactly.

RUSH: Do you realize the Republican Party has stopped doing that, and it's an automatic winner. You know, I can't believe this. It wasn't that long ago, Paula, the word "liberal" was the worst thing you could say about a Democrat. They didn't want it. It meant their defeat. And they've pulled off a 180 and now "Republican" has come to mean something as negative as "liberal" did to people. So your observation here is right on the money, not just explain conservatism, but also explain liberalism to these people.

RUSH: Well, see, now, in that little story is a little gem of truth. Democrats of a certain age don't recognize what's happened to their party, and I'm telling you that can happen to a lot of people. Now, the other thing, what I was gonna tell you was that Jack Kemp, who was at the right hand of Ronald Reagan throughout the eighties and early nineties, he had such programs. They were called reaching out, enterprise zones and a number of other things where they had as an agenda to actually go into minority populated areas, primarily Democrat voters. What they tried to do was introduce capitalism, which had its own negative connotations. They didn't really explain ideology. I think you're so right on. I think that what is missing in every bit of Republican outreach is ideology.

You know me, folks. I've always believed, if people understood what liberalism is, no Democrat would ever get elected. Well, that was true 15 years ago. I still think it could be made to be the case. I don't think people were voting ideologically for Obama. Obama was something that was apolitical to them. Now, you mentioned Dr. Carson, and I'm glad you brought him up because I want to make another point, or I want to make the same point again. I think that if you want to characterize it as the fact that he's got a secret, a secret to his success, Dr. Carson, let me be blatant, let me be honest here. This not criticism. Please don't take it that way. Dr. Carson is saying things that are no different than other conservatives say or have said.

So why -- this is the question -- why is Dr. Carson being so embraced? Why is there such hope invested in Ben Carson? Why are people so eager to embrace him? He's not the first to criticize Obamacare. He's not the first to offer an alternative to Obamacare. He wasn't the first to offer his alternative to Obamacare. Countless Republicans have done that. Countless conservatives in the Republican primary campaigns. There were all kinds of people that pointed out the fallacies of Obamacare and had really good ways of getting rid of it and really good ways of fixing health care.

Now, don't misunderstand. I am not at all criticizing Dr. Carson. Just the opposite. Why is it -- this is the question that I think Republicans could be well served if they would answer this honestly. What is it about Ben Carson that does not frighten people? What is it about Ben Carson that doesn't scare people who aren't conservative? Well, he scares the Democrat Party. But I'm not counting those people. I'm talking about just average, ordinary Americans, voters. What is it about him that does not threaten them? Yet they are threatened by -- pick your conservative, threatened by Romney, threatened by Newt, I mean, take your pick, threatened by me, it doesn't matter. Why are they not threatened by him?

There's an answer to this. And it is, I think, that Dr. Carson is not perceived to have an agenda. He has the ability to speak to people without raising his voice, as though he's sitting in their living room, just having a conversation, or at the kitchen table, whatever circumstance you want to imagine. He's entirely nonthreatening. There's no pointing fingers. There's no accusations about anybody. There's just nothing threatening. And I think it is really key that he is perceived as not having an agenda.

Now, does he have an agenda? Well, of course. If he has a vision for the country that differs from what we're currently doing, he obviously does, but he doesn't present himself that way, and as such, he doesn't come off as threatening. People with agendas are seen as wanting to control people or wanting to deny people certain things. He doesn't come across that way at all. And I think he just does this instinctively. I think he's got the knack. Obama's got the same talent, by the way.

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RUSH: One more thing about Ben Carson here, folks. I do think he comes across as unthreatening in the sense of, he's not trying to push anything on anybody, and nobody has any suspicions of him yet. He's gonna have the predictable automatic opposition from wacko leftists, but as of yet there hasn't been any substantive opposition arise.

I think people are attracted to Dr. Carson for another reason. There he was sitting right next to Obama at the prayer breakfast, right there in the face of ultimate power in this country, and faced him down. He was sitting side by side with the most powerful guy in this country and ripped that guy to shreds without appearing to attack him. He just ripped Obama's ideas apart. He just exposed them for being the fraudulent ideas, Obamacare, that they are. He took it directly to Obama, just like Rand Paul did on the Senate floor in his filibuster, as a matter of fact.

So in addition to all this other stuff, Ben Carson demonstrates leadership and principle. He makes you want to follow him. There are a lot of reasons to explain his attraction right now, his effectiveness. I don't mean this as a put-down. I really don't. In fact, I think that this is really fascinating. Now, he did say it to Obama's face. That's something that hasn't happened, other than when Paul Ryan did it in a budget meeting that nobody saw. Prayer breakfast, everybody saw that. But nobody takes it to Obama. Now, there are all kinds of people that have the same ideas about Obamacare, same criticisms, same fixes. Buts they address them in a static kind of way that doesn't really inspire any leadership to follow them. Carson does that.

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RUSH: Here's John in Stafford, New Jersey. John, I'm glad you waited. Great to have you on the program. Hi.

CALLER: Mr. Limbaugh, it's an honor. I'm a 25-year-old medical student, and, you know, when I want a study break sometimes I'll read an article, scroll down to the comments section, and if I want to get a laugh or get infuriated I'll go to the New York Times and read it. Here's what they had to say about Benjamin Carson here in that comments section. It gives good insight to what the liberal talking heads will probably be saying in the media. There's three of them I like. One, that he is the black conservative slaver of the month much like Herman Cain was and Michael Steele. Two, he grew up in the inner city with assistance but now he's rich and he's turning his back on that, and three, I like this one, that surgeons notoriously have large egos, bad interpersonal skills, and lack of compassion, you know, kind of a stereotype that hearkens back to the old joke that --

RUSH: All right, now, let me tell you something. That's from the comments section of the New York Times piece on him?

CALLER: Yes, sir.

RUSH: Yeah. Every one of those comments is rooted in fear of the guy.

CALLER: Hm-hm.

RUSH: And it's also rooted in the only thing the left has, and that's to smear. This article talks about what he believes in. This article talks about his ideas. Those comments, I'll wager you, you can't find one comment that objects to any idea he's got. Those comments are all personal assaults, insults, mischaracterizations, impugning him, this kind of thing, correct?

CALLER: Yeah. Yeah.

RUSH: That's all they've got. That's all, but it works. The problem is it works if it's not reacted to. It worked in the case of Romney. Now, in the case of the New York Times piece and the comments that's pro forma, but it is out there in the radical -- people that read the New York Times are radical leftists. The New York Times is not a mainstream American newspaper, contrary to what people might think. It is a radical left newspaper, its readers are radical leftists, and they make up the idiocracy of this country. And you're right, it's a harbinger of what will be coming his way if he is to demonstrate that he's got aspirations beyond just being a guest on TV shows. The New York Times, they don't really open their comments section very much, but they did open it on the Carson story, because they're collecting ammo. This is some opposition research inspiration. It's one of the reasons why they've opened the comment section on it.